Douglas J. Sorocco

Dunlap Codding is Oklahoma's oldest and largest intellectual property boutique law firm, serving a global and sophisticated client base since 1957. Its client ranks include Schlumberger, Siemens, Pictometry, Millennium and DuPont.  Dunlap Codding offers strategic and pragmatic problem solving skills and micro-customized client service across all areas of intellectual property, including IP litigation and licensing. The firm's technology coverage is extensive, ranging from the mechanical arts to nanotechnology and life sciences. 

Dunlap Codding is a leader with regard to the quality and strength of its mechanical engineering practice, representing 100+ clients from around the globe and providing new approaches to patenting their mechanical inventions.  The firm represents the most prolific living inventor in the United States.  Its mechanical practice has been recognized as one of the top two practices in the United States, and it has obtained mechanical patents covering virtually every machine known to man.

With regard to the firm's electrical and software patent practice, it is selected by clients for its experience and acumen in developing defensible and likely to be infringed portfolios, with more such patents that have withstood the rigors of litigation than any other firm in the region.  The firm obtained the fundamental patents covering the downloading of ‘digital data’ on the Internet, patents later successfully litigated and deemed to be valid and enforceable by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and subsequently licensed to technology companies such as Apple, IBM, and Microsoft. 

The firm is the preferred provider to some of the world’s largest chemical companies, handling the development of complex patent portfolios and transactional items. The firm's ranks include a former Fortune 500 corporate patent general counsel as well as former research chemists with Ph.D. degrees. Dunlap Codding writes and prosecutes patents on front line chemical engineering technologies and provides strategic planning and facilitated innovation services.  It conducts complex freedom to operate analyses, provides infringement and invalidity opinions as well as due diligence analyses in connection with capital investments. Using an in-house proprietary process, it provides facilitated patent strategy sessions and identifies market entry opportunities. 

With regard to biotechnology and life sciences, Dunlap Codding represents numerous national and international companies in the field of immunology.  It routinely assists legacy and start-up companies in the acquisition and exploitation of patent portfolios of cutting-edge research in the areas of pharmaceuticals, life sciences, medical devices, immunology proteomics and genomics. Dunlap Codding's clients turn to them for trademark, copyright, trade secret, Internet and e-commerce guidance on matters such as the selection and registration of the strongest possible marks, clearance searches and infringement analysis, and creating proactive strategies to protect existing marks. The firm conducts global trademark audits allowing companies to review, manage, and fully exploit the value of existing and potential trademarks.  Its copyright practice extends to education and counselling, federal and international copyright registration, licenses and agreements (of all types), and litigation in state and federal courts. 

Douglas J. Sorocco practices in the areas of intellectual property, technology, licensing, life sciences and patent law and is involved in counselling and transactional work involving all aspects of intellectual property. He is registered to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Doug regularly counsels clients in all aspects of intellectual property including acquisition and commercialization of intellectual property, portfolio management, licensing and transactional matters. He is ranked among Oklahoma’s top intellectual property practitioners by the highly regarded Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business. Doug was recently selected by attorney peers for inclusion in Oklahoma Super Lawyers–Rising Stars Edition (2010).

Mr Sorocco scientific background has focused on all areas of biotechnology and life sciences (including molecular biology, cell biology, glycobiology, biochemistry, developmental biology, immunology, microbiology, virology, and genetics; pharmaceutical compositions; molecular diagnostics and techniques; medical devices and equipment) as well as chemistry and chemical engineering. Doug has significant experience in providing strategic and tactical intellectual property counsel to individual clients, universities, large pharmaceutical and manufacturing companies, and start-up biotechnology companies.

He is an adjunct faculty member at the Oklahoma City University School of Law and in the Physiology Department at Oklahoma University Health Sciences Centre. Prior to joining Dunlap Codding in 1996, Doug was a member of Dick & Harris, a Chicago intellectual property boutique law firm.